Luka Doncic and the Mavs Hold Off Brooklyn
Coming off a back-to-back, the Nets didn’t look as they were tired in the first quarters of the game. Just as in the other losses from this season, they kept it close the entire game, going back-and-forth until the 4th quarter. The problems with them seem to be the fourth, they can’t close out the game, and that is maybe because both Kyrie and Durant have to kind of do all the work for the Nets from the beginning to the end, so fatigue can be a factor for them, going into that last period. However, last night they managed to tie the game being behind by five, late in the game. Ben Simmons made a huge defensive play, stealing the ball from Luka with 14 seconds left, and passing it to Durant on the fast break for the slam to tie it 112-a-piece.
It looked like we were going to see a battle until the last whistle, but the Mavs came out shooting the lights out in overtime, as they made three straight 3-pointers, while Brooklyn shot just 1/5 from beyond-the-arc, so it is an easy math for you to do from here.
Luka Doncic was doing it all on the floor, from start, to finish. He had a 41-point triple-double, with 14 assists and 11 rebounds on 50 FG%, also setting up for his teammates all the 3s made in the overtime.
The defensive scheme of the Nets let Luka dominate them all night, just by size, as he was constantly killing them on the switch. Kyrie defended way too much on him the entire night, and if you are Steve Nash, you simply can’t agree with that. This is where the game was won, and maybe Nash didn’t want to put Ben Simmons from the beginning on him in fear that he will be in foul trouble yet again, but you could see a difference when Ben was guarding Luka. I mean, you can’t really stop him, because he is that great of a player, but at least you have to make it hard for him to score. That couldn’t be made by Irving, who was inches smaller.
Friendly reminder: Luka is only 23 years old‼️ pic.twitter.com/vmsJTrBQ0o
— NBA on ESPN (@ESPNNBA) October 28, 2022
